Point of View

A Cool Million is narrated in the first person as though by a storyteller. However, they are unnamed and only rarely speak directly to the reader. The majority of the writing is his third person narrative of events. Occasionally they stop to give additional information or an opinion such as, “it might interest the reader to know that I was right in my surmise” (6). The narrator often gives the reader cues in recognition that they are telling a story. For example, after the initial scene outside the Salvation Army the narrator chimes in with, “but let us leave Mr. Whipple and Lem busy with their recruiting to observe the actions of a certain member of the crowd.” This was the style used in Horatio Alger novels and West continuously uses it both for his comical advantage and to speed up the story to its crucial...